4.  The applicant was born in 1924 and lived in Baia Mare.
5.  In 1950, a house and 1,867 sq. m of appurtenant land situated in Zalău, Andrei Şaguna no. 20, the property of the applicant’s mother, were seized by the State under Decree no. 92/1950 on nationalisation.
6.  The property was subsequently divided into two apartments. In 1973 the applicant’s father bought Apartment 1 and in 1974 the applicant’s uncle bought Apartment 2.
7.  On 18 September 1997 the applicant brought court proceedings for recovery of property, including restitution in kind of the appurtenant land of 1,617 sq. m and compensation for the remaining plot of 250 sq. m, which had been allocated to a third party as building land. He also sought to have the sales of the two apartments declared null and void.
8.  On 4 February 1999 the Zalău Court of First Instance allowed the action in part and awarded the applicant the equivalent value of Apartment 2 and the updated amount paid by his father for Apartment 1. The court refused to declare the sale of Apartment 2 null and void, as the applicant had been given compensation, and dismissed his demand for restitution in kind of the 1,617 sq. m of appurtenant land on the ground that it had not satisfied the conditions required by Law no. 18/1991.
9.  On 3 August 1999 the Sălaj County Court upheld an appeal by the applicant and by the town council, quashed the judgment of the first-instance court and sent the case back for fresh consideration.
10.  During retrial, on 7 December 1999 the Court of First Instance decided that the case was within the competence of the County Court.
11.  On 20 October 2000 the Sălaj County Court awarded the applicant the equivalent value of Apartment 2, the updated amount paid by his father for Apartment 1 and dismissed his request to have the sale of Apartment 2 declared null and void.
12.  The applicant and the Ministry of Public Finance (“the Ministry”) appealed, the former claiming restitution in kind of Apartment 2 as well.
13.  On 11 May 2001 the Cluj Court of Appeal dismissed the two appeals. It held that the applicant’s uncle had acquired a right of property over Apartment 2 by acquisitive prescription. The court also held that the seizure of the property had been unlawful and following the decease of his father Apartment 1 had entered into the ownership of the applicant and of his father’s sister, being thus registered in the Land Register. It further confirmed that there were no allegations that Apartment 1 was in the ownership of the State or of third parties.
14.  On 25 June 2003 the Supreme Court of Justice allowed a further appeal by the applicant and by the Ministry, quashed the previous judgment and sent the case back for a fresh examination. It found that the lower courts had not been concerned with the precise description of the property which was the object of the applicant’s action.
15.  After the retrial, on 14 April 2004 the Cluj Court of Appeal allowed the appeal by the Ministry and rejected the applicant’s action, considering that the buyers of the two apartments were in good faith. It held that the appurtenant land of 1,617 sq. m belonged to the private domain of the State and therefore it was the Mayor who should have been brought to trial, not the Ministry. The court also considered that, for the plot of 250 sq. m of appurtenant land, the third party should have been brought to trial, and that the claim for damages for the two apartments had been time-barred, and was anyway incidental to the request for the annulment of the sales.
16.  On 10 October 2005 the Cluj Court of Appeal, by a final decision, upheld in part a further appeal by the applicant and declared null and void the sale of Apartment 1. It considered that the seizure of the whole property which had belonged to the applicant’s mother was unlawful and that his father had clearly been in bad faith when he had bought Apartment 1. It ordered the State to pay the applicant pecuniary damages in respect of Apartment 1, representing the updated amount paid by his father.
As for Apartment 2, the court considered that the applicant’s uncle had made the purchase in good faith, trusting the content of the Land Register. However, it held that the applicant expressly requested only restitution in kind, not alternative compensation, hence the first-instance court was at fault when it awarded compensation for Apartment 2.
With reference to Apartment 1, the court considered impossible to rectify the situation in the Land Register by establishing a right of property for the applicant’s mother over that apartment, as the applicant had failed to bring to trial his father’s sister, who owned a portion of it.
17.  On 8 November 2001 the applicant made a request under Law no. 10/2001 governing immovable property wrongfully seized by the State, seeking restitution in kind of his property, namely the house and the 1,867 sq. m of appurtenant land.
18.  On 6 June 2005 the Mayor of Zalău rejected his request on the ground that the applicant had not submitted all necessary documents to substantiate his claims.
19.  The applicant contested the mayor’s decision before the courts. There is no evidence in the file as to the course of the proceedings.
20.  In 2005 the applicant lodged an administrative request for restitutio in integrum of the appurtenant land of 1,867 sq. m.
21.  On 25 August 2006 the county commission in Sălaj responsible for the application of property laws rejected that request. The applicant’s wife contested that decision before the courts, claiming the plot of 1,867 sq. m in the original location.
22.  Two expert reports of 23 May and 13 July 2007 certified that the applicant’s quota of Apartment 1 was in the ownership of his three heirs, as also mentioned in the certificate of inheritance, that the appurtenant land of 1,367 sq. m was in the State’s ownership and that 250 sq. m of appurtenant land were in the ownership of a third party. Apartment 2, having an area and therefore situated on a plot of land of 75 sq. m, together with two plots of appurtenant land of 82 sq. m and 93 sq. m, were in the ownership of the heirs of the applicant’s uncle.
23.  On 11 October 2007 the Zalău Court of First Instance, on the basis of the expert reports, allowed the action, authorised the applicant’s wife to recover possession of 1,867 sq. m of land, and ordered the local authorities to enable her to take possession of the 1,367 sq. m of land appurtenant to the house and to allocate her a plot of 500 sq. m in another location, as provided by Article 10 of Government Ordinance no. 890/2005.
An appeal by the applicant’s wife, claiming restitution in kind of the plot of 250 sq. m inherited by the heirs of the buyers of Apartment 2, was subsequently dismissed and that judgment became final.
24.  On 10 June 2008 the applicant’s wife requested the courts to declare that the judgment of 11 October 2007 could be enforced.